The History of the Right to Bear Arms - Early Gun Control Laws

The seventeenth century was a period of great turmoil in England as Parliament and the monarchy struggled for control of the government. When a civil war erupted in 1642, a critical issue was whether the king or Parliament had the right to control the militia. When the civil war ended in 1660, England fell briefly under the control of a military government, which authorized its officers to search for and seize all arms owned by Catholics or any other person deemed dangerous. The Game Act of 1671, the first recorded example of a gun control law, was enacted to keep the ownership of hunting lands and weaponry in the hands of the wealthy and to restrict hunting and gun ownership among the peasants. Persons without an annual income of at least forty to one hundred pounds could no longer legally keep weapons, even for self-defense.